AUSTIN -- Local governments that prohibit employees from enforcing immigration laws risk losing state grant funding and could be sued under a Republican-backed bill that was temporarily derailed Friday in the Texas House.

The bill calls for the elimination of so-called sanctuary cities for undocumented immigrants, though its author has said that he cannot specifically identify which Texas cities fit that category.

It would prevent cities from establishing any policy that keeps law enforcement and other employees from asking about the immigration status of people they detain or arrest for violating laws that could include traffic violations.

Any citizens could complain to the attorney general if they believed a local government has established such a policy. The attorney general could then file a lawsuit.

Democrats managed to stall the bill on a technicality because an unnamed lawmaker on the State Affairs Committee may have filled in a form for a woman who was testifying that showed her as being against the legislation. Because the woman never testified, lawmakers could not verify if the committee had misrepresented her position.

State Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer, D-San Antonio, who pointed out the technicality, said Democrats would not sit idly and allow the Republican-dominated House to pass such a measure. He said Republicans, who make up 101 of the 150-member House, were "going to have to run us over."

"We all recognize that this is probably the single largest assault on being Latino in the state of Texas," Martinez Fischer said.

Advertisement

But Republicans, who said the bill would be back on the House floor by Monday, had their own message for Democrats about trying to slow Gov. Rick Perry's emergency legislation.

Time is running out to pass legislation in the state House, but the sanctuary city bill will make it through, even if it is at the expense of other legislation, said state Rep. Charlie Geren, R-Fort Worth.

"Some of those members may have bills that they're concerned about dying, too," Geren said.

"I know I've got several, so it depends how important their legislation is to them, because we're going to pass this bill."

Before delaying the bill, Democrats tried to pass various amendments that would give cities, counties, police chiefs or sheriffs the ability to opt out from the provisions of the bill. They said the bill could lead to racial profiling.

Republicans shot down Democrats' amendments, saying the bill does not force officers to check immigration status but rather gives them discretion.

The bill's author, Burt Solo mons, R-Carrollton, said local governments should not be able to "pick and choose" what laws they want to enforce.

"At the end of the day, if we have rogue officers trying to profile people, I think the police departments have policies in place already to deal with officers who aren't doing their job correctly," Solomons said.

El Paso County Sheriff Richard Wiles and other law enforcement leaders in the state have said such legislation could cost taxpayers millions of dollars to house undocumented immigrants in jails, pay for officer training and fight lawsuits that may arise.

In addition, those leaders say, the legislation would dismantle the trust that law enforcement has established with communities and make people less willing to report crimes. They also argue that they need the discretion to set priorities for their officers.

El Paso's four Democrats in the House said they are against the bill. Republican Dee Margo supports the legislation.

"Contrary to what I hear from Sheriff Wiles, as I read the bill and as Chairman Solomon's explained it, I don't believe it puts the burden on local police and sheriff's deputies," Margo said. "All it does is say that you can't preclude it."

State Rep. Chente Quintanilla, D-El Paso, said that Democrats do not support illegal immigration but that Republican lawmakers are "grandstanding" and trying to satisfy campaign promises they made during their primary elections.

Quintanilla, however, said that of the 101 Republicans in the House, "only a handful are fully racist about this issue."

Still, he said that they should consider the unintended consequences for Hispanics who were born in the United States.

Quintanilla said he was trying to explain to the lawmaker who sits next to him in the House how differently they would be treated under the proposed law.

"Let's say both of us get picked up for DWI," Quintanilla said. "Who do you think is going to be asked for their citizenship?"